predictions revisited Archives - Michael's Programming Bytes

But first, a few words on the NBA finals…

Wow wow wow what a Finals that was! I mean, first of all, there were two solid teams in the Indiana Pacers (50-32, 4th in East) and Oklahoma City Thunder (68-14, 1st in West). Second of all, it went the distance as it was the first NBA Finals to go a full 7 games since the 2016 Finals (that of the Warriors’ blown 3-1 lead and the Lebron-led Cavs’ comeback-like-no-other).

The momentum was back-and-forth, and it felt like the series could’ve gone in favor of either the Pacers or Thunder. Tyrese Haliburton’s Game 1 2-point clutch shot to give the Pacers the Game 1 win. OKC rallying back with their defense in Game 2 to keep the Pacers at bay. The Pacers’ blowout Game 6 win at home to even force a Game 7. OKC rallying back in the second half of Game 7, holding the Pacers to just 42 second-half points to ultimately win their first championship (and congrats to Shai Gilgeous-Alexander on winning 2025 NBA Finals & 2025 regular season MVP). I’ve got to hand it to the Pacers’ resilience in Game 7, because even though they didn’t win, they-especially their bench players like TJ McConnell-gave it their all after Tyrese Haliburton went out in the first quarter with a torn Achilles (well wishes to him on recovery).

The mid-season trades (especially THAT trade)

It wouldn’t be an NBA season-in-review/predictions-revisited post without reviewing all of the crazy stuff that went down in the midseason trades.

Personally, as wild as off-season free agency can be (anyone remember LeBron’s “I’m taking my talents to South Beach”?) I think the mid-season trades can be even wilder, especially this season. Let’s go over the most notable examples, shall we?

Jimmy Butler (Miami Heat –> Golden State Warriors)
De’Aaron Fox (Sacramento Kings –> San Antonio Spurs)
Khris Middleton (Milwaukee Bucks –> Washington Wizards)
Andrew Wiggins (Golden State Warriors –> Miami Heat-part of the Jimmy Butler trade package)

And for the most notable 2025 midseason trade (yes THAT trade):

Anthony Davis from the LA Lakers to the Dallas Mavericks/Luka Doncic from the Dallas Mavericks to the LA Lakers

Personally, I thought this takes the cake for most shocking midseason NBA trade in quite some time! I mean, no one expected (least of all Doncic himself) that Dallas would trade away a franchise icon in his prime-he’s 26-for a 32-year-old Anthony Davis. It’s especially wild considering A) it was largely done in secrecy and B) Luka took the Mavs to the Finals just the previous year. Time will tell how this plays out, but personally, I think the Lakers got the better deal (getting Markeiff Morris and Maxi Klieber in that package didn’t hurt either). After all, the Lakers got the 3-seed in the West this year, while the Mavericks fell to the 10-seed and didn’t make it past play-in (though the Mavs’ especially bad luck with injuries didn’t help). Luka could certainly bring the Lakers much success, especially in the post-LeBron years to come.

Side note: it will be interesting to see how Dallas’s #1 overall 2025 draft pick of Cooper Flagg will pan out. Perhaps he’ll be the new Doncic in Dallas and fit right in with Klay, Kyrie and the rest of the Mavs?

And now, we reflect…

So, how accurate were my opening day predications for the season? Let’s review those predictions shall we?

Eastern Conference Edition

So, here were my opening day predictions for how things in the Eastern Conference would pan out:

INTO THE PLAYOFFS	INTO THE PLAY-IN	OUT OF PLAYOFF RUNNING
1. Milwaukee Bucks	7. Cleveland Cavaliers	11. Chicago Bulls
2. Boston Celtics	8. Indiana Pacers	12. Washington Wizards
3. Philadelphia 76ers	9. Atlanta Hawks	13. Charlotte Hornets
4. Miami Heat	10. New York Knicks	14. Orlando Magic
5. Toronto Raptors		15. Detroit Pistons
6. Brooklyn Nets

Here’s how things actually played out:

INTO THE PLAYOFFS	INTO THE PLAY-IN	OUT OF PLAYOFF RUNNING
1. Cleveland Cavaliers	7. Orlando Magic (made playoffs)	11. Toronto Raptors
2. Boston Celtics	8. Atlanta Hawks	12. Brooklyn Nets
3. New York Knicks	9. Chicago Bulls	13. Philadelphia 76ers
4. Indiana Pacers	10. Miami Heat (made playoffs)	14. Charlotte Hornets
5. Milwaukee Bucks		15. Washington Wizards
6. Detroit Pistons

In total, here’s a rundown of how right/off I was:

Only 2/6 teams I picked to get a top-6 spot in the East (and get a direct playoff spot) were correct (Bucks and Celtics)
3/6 teams I picked to get a top-6 spot in the East didn’t even make play-in (Nets, Sixers, and Raptors)
Only 1 correct play-in pick for the East (Hawks)-the other three play-in teams actually got top-6 spots
3/5 teams that I thought weren’t going to make playoffs at least made play-in (Magic, Pistons, and Bulls). None of these teams got further than the Eastern Conference quarterfinals, however.
Of the 15 teams in the East, 7 teams finished better than I expected, 7 teams finished worse than I expected, and 1 team finished in the exact spot I thought they would.
Teams that finished better than I thought they would: Cavaliers, Knicks, Pacers, Pistons, Hawks, Bulls, and Magic
Teams that finished worse than I thought they would: Bucks, Heat, Nets, 76ers, Raptors, Wizards, Hornets
Team that finished exactly as I thought they would: Celtics (2-seed)

Takeaways from the East…

The Miami Heat, despite finishing 10th in the East, earning a play-in spot for the third straight season, and all the Jimmy Butler drama leading up to the midseason trade, still managed to surprise me in that they became the first 10-seed playoff team to make the playoffs. Then they promptly got swept by the Cleveland Cavaliers in the first round, including two straight 30+ point losses at home. Maybe the lottery pick might’ve been better for them?
I know I’ve talked about earlier in this post, but I’ve got to give the Indiana Pacers credit where credit is due. Despite a slow 10-15 start to the season, they eventually found their rhythm, both offensively and defensively. The return of key players like Aaron Neismith and Tyrese Haliburton’s 2nd-half-of-the-season resurgence certainly helped propel the Pacers to the NBA Finals (and help the series go the distance against the OKC Thunder)
On the other side of the coin, teams like the Philadelphia 76ers fell far below expectations this season, finishing with a 13-seed in the East, no playoffs or play-in, and a 24-58 record. The highly-anticipated acquisition of Paul George from the LA Clippers and the formation of a new Sixers’ Big-3 with George, Joel Embiid and Tyrese Maxsey didn’t quite pan out, especially due to a knee injury for George, a torn meniscus for Embiid, and a sprained finger for Maxsey, which ended up becoming season-ending injuries for all three players.
The Milwaukee Bucks, despite finishing with a 5-seed in the East and a solid regular season, certainly didn’t look like the championship Bucks squad of 2020-21. Injuries to Giannis Antetokounmpo and Damian Lilliard didn’t help matters in the playoffs, nor did their blown late-game playoff leads-especially their infamous 118-111 lead in OT of game 5 against the Pacers…that the Pacers still won by 1, thus eliminating the Bucks.

Western Conference Edition

Now let’s see how things panned out in the Western Conference? Here’s how I thought things would go:

INTO THE PLAYOFFS	INTO THE PLAY-IN	OUT OF PLAYOFF RUNNING
1. Denver Nuggets	7. LA Lakers	11. Sacramento Kings
2. LA Clippers	8. Memphis Grizzlies	12. New Orleans Pelicans
3. Golden State Warriors	9. Oklahoma City Thunder	13. San Antonio Spurs
4. Phoenix Suns	10. Minnesota Timberwolves	14. Portland Trailblazers
5. Dallas Mavericks		15. Houston Rockets
6. Utah Jazz

And here’s how things actually went for the teams in the West:

INTO THE PLAYOFFS	INTO THE PLAY-IN	OUT OF PLAYOFF RUNNING
1. Oklahoma City Thunder	7. Golden State Warriors (made playoffs)	11. Phoenix Suns
2. Houston Rockets	8. Memphis Grizzlies (made playoffs)	12. Portland Trail Blazers
3. LA Lakers	9. Sacramento Kings	13. San Antonio Spurs
4. Denver Nuggets	10. Dallas Mavericks	14. New Orleans Pelicans
5. LA Clippers		15. Utah Jazz
6. Minnesota Timberwolves

In total, here’s a rundown of how right/off I was (Western Conference edition).

It’s worth noting that my Western Conference predictions have several similarities with my Eastern Conference predictions:
- 2/6 teams that I predicted would get a top-6 spot did just that (Clippers and Nuggets)
- 3/6 teams that I predicted would get a top-6 spot didn’t even make the play-in (Suns, Mavericks and Jazz)
- Only 1 correct play-in pick for the west (Grizzlies)-the other three teams were straight shots into the playoffs (with “9-seed” OKC finishing as the champions)
- For both the East and West, the teams I had finishing as the “bottom seed” both made it directly to playoffs (with Pistons as 6-seed and Rockets as 2-seed)
- There were some differences between my East predictions and West predictions:
- Only 2/6 teams that I thought weren’t going to playoffs at least made play-ins (Kings and Rockets). Just like the East though, neither of these teams made it past the Western Conference quarterfinals.
- In total, 6 teams in the West finished better than I expected, 7 teams finished worse than I expected, and 2 teams finished in the exact spot I expected.
- Teams that finished better than I thought they would: Lakers, Thunder, Timberwolves, Kings, Trailblazers, Rockets
- Teams that finished worse than I thought they would: Nuggets, Clippers, Warriors, Mavericks, Jazz, Suns, Pelicans
- Teams that finished in the exact spot I thought they would: Spurs (13-seed) and Grizzlies (8-seed)

Takeaways from the west…

One team I certainly underestimated was the Houston Rockets. To think my Michael-made ML model put them as the 15-seed in the West-boy did they outperform my model’s expectations (finishing as the 2-seed in the West). Sure, they did get upset in the Western Conference first round by the play-in Warriors, but the combination of good veterans with Fred VanVleet and Jeff Green, solid offensive contributors like Alpern Sengun, solid defensive contributors with guys like Amen Thompson, and coach Ime Udoka, I think the Rockets will go far in the years to come. Now to see how adding KD in free agency will elevate the Rockets.
And now for the Warriors…I mean, at least they’ve got a solid Big-3 in Draymond Green, Jimmy Butler and of course, Stephen Curry. However, they did have an up-and-down season, finishing with a 48-34 record and a 7-seed play-in spot. The mid-season acquisition of Jimmy Butler from the Heat certainly gave the Warriors more defensive spark (and in my opinion, I think Miami got a solid asset in Andrew Wiggins). I think it would do the Warriors a lot of good to think about their future-after all, they can only roll with guys like Jimmy Butler and Draymond Green for so long-both of whom will turn 36 next season. Plus I think it would be satisfying to make one more championship run with Steph Curry and Draymond Green, who have been with the Warriors for 15+ years and four championships.
On the other end of the playoff coin, what happened to the bottom-of-the-West (and bottom-of-the-NBA) Utah Jazz? Granted, I know they haven’t been great since the departures of Rudy Gobert and Donovan Mitchell, but losing one of their most promising assets in Taylor Hendricks to a fractured fibula and dislocated ankle just three games into the season certainly didn’t help matters for the Jazz. Hopefully the Jazz’ 2025 draft class-led by small forward Ace Bailey-will reverse their fortunes and bring them back into playoff contention. Maybe adding Kevin Love in free agency will give them a boost of veteran player-coach leadership?
Last but not least, let’s talk about the San Antonio Spurs-one of only three teams whose seeding I got exactly right (13-seed). Granted, going from 14-seed last season to 13-seed this season might not sound like a huge improvement, but I think Victor Wembanyama definitely has potential to be a franchise icon, as he showed his defensive potential this season despite his season-ending blood clot after All-Star Break. The mid-season acquisition of De’Aaron Fox and the coaching transition from Coach “Pop” Popovich to Mitch Johnson could help rejuvenate the Spurs and, who knows, maybe even bring them back to the playoffs for the first time since 2019.

Thanks for reading. What a great NBA season it was! I’ll certainly admit I had fun writing this 3-post series to not only try and predict the upcoming NBA season, but also to reflect on how my predictions fared after the season has concluded. After all, an important skill of data analysis is learning how to gather insights from the data!

Michael

Also, congrats OKC on winning the 2025 NBA championship!

Tag: predictions revisited

2024-25 NBA Season Predictions Revisited & OKC’s First Championship